Saturday, July 17, 2010

When I started this blog in February of this year, my intent was to confront the problems that are damaging the field of paranormal research. Yes, I’ve talked about the lack of education, training, and professionalism as well as the abundance of thrill seeking and the competitiveness we face every time we set forth to find truth to the paranormal.

The diversity of ghost hunting groups is commendable. We all want and deserve to make our individual mark in the ghost hunting community. However, with the lack of internal communication and/or in helping our neighboring ghost hunters, more and more problems develop around us.

Those who know me personally will agree that I’m really a nice guy. Not so angry. But I'm very passionate when it comes to ghosts and the research. As my group and I continued to work on finding answers, my frustration grew. So many doors were closed, so little participation and hardly any communication with other groups. I wanted to take on these issues, talk about them and bring them to the surface. We need to acknowledge as a society that there are problems with our habits, attitudes and procedures. Are we so afraid to face the monster in the closet?

Discussing these problems may help us to tame the beast. What the ghost hunting community lacks is the unity, standards, and a force in helping us all find a common truth to the unknown. We do need to come together, build upon each other’s knowledge and learn what each one of us can offer the community. Because if we are so afraid of the monsters in our closets, then how can we face the challenge of ghosts in our homes?

Come one, come all and see the most amazing spectacle of strange phenomena that baffle the ghost hunters and people living with the unseen world! Watch as the dishes fly across the room and feel the forces of invisible hands touch your flesh! Could these be what we call ghosts? Venture in and find out for yourself!

It’s pretty tempting to see what all the commotion is about. There’s that tall dark figure lifting the curtain and pointing in on what we might find to be our worst fears or even a satisfying dose of curiosity. I know if I was you, I’d be trying to take a peek into the darkened room. We all want to. So, what if you do walk in? What if what he said was true? There really is something to all these bizarre happenings that we call ghost encounters. Do I run out in a frenzy, trying not to look back to see if something is following me? Or do I face my fears and look a little longer and harder at what might be looking back? As for me, I’m going in and taking in all I can find out. For all I know all the whole, eery spectacle could be nothing more then smoke and mirrors.

I guess it goes to show just how much of an investigator I want or try to be. Throughout my life, I've spent over 20 years looking to see the invisible wires pulling the sheet down the hall. I’ve always been the type to really want to know how things work. How is it possible and what is the reason for all this? When ghost hunting began in the late 1850’s, it was a case of experience outweighing curiosity. Most ventured off to reenact phenomena they encountered themselves. Some looked for proof to claims that mediums were indeed speaking to the dead. Then their were those checking out the wizard behind the green curtain. Stop! Pay no attention to him, it will ruin the illusion!

When it comes to ghost hunting today, we as ghost hunters have to face that illusion every time. It’s the trick of light, the false impressions and even the lack of education that feed our hopes as well as our fears. So my argument for this month is: Where is the training and education needed to further us along? I find that a lot of groups don’t offer training or don’t constantly feed their minds with new ideas or research old ones. It’s as simple as “here’s a haunted place, lets go!”. With cameras and gadgets in hand, we find that so much can go wrong if you don’t know what the hell you are doing. Come On!! The sad thing really is, there is no standard to what we do as ghost hunters. So how can we help all these groups popping up left and right if we, the more experienced investigators, can't or won't even help ourselves? So many groups do investigating in so many different ways. There’s the psychic ghost hunters, the thrill seekers, the “it’s odd, so it must be a ghost” groups or even the “I don’t believe in you unless you can rip my heart from my chest” type of groups. Each and every one out there has their belief system of how it should be done. But without a standard way of doing things, in all honesty we may never get the chance to advance as paranormal researchers.

Having a standard practice will help us all support our individual evidence. Here we may never have to question one another on how the phenomena was captured. A standard will bring us all on the same page. Here we can eliminate all the human errors that get labeled as ghostly encounters. If we all worked on protocols, standards in reporting and documentation, we as a ghost hunting community would be able to stand together and stand by our own personal achievements. For as I always said, It wont be the work of one or even of some, but of ALL.